Once In Afghanistan

USA, 2008, 70 Minute Running Time
Genre/Subject: Documentary

One Night Only! Thursday, January 13 at 7pm
Two of the films subjects, Jan Reimer and Jacki Davidson will be in-person for a post film Q&A sessionDigital presentation - After 9/11, a group of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers documented their stories and images in the film “Once in Afghanistan.” They’d served in Afghanistan before the decades of violence began and still vividly recalled the hospitality of the people. The American women had joined teams of Afghan male vaccinators stationed either over the Hindu Kush Mountains north of Kabul or in the southern, more conservative part of this Muslim country. It was 1969 and the World Health Organization had made eradication of smallpox its top priority. Struggling with the challenges of vaccinating in a country of high mountains and vast deserts where many of the Afghan women and older girls could not be seen, much less vaccinated, by a male outside her family, the Peace Corps vaccinators began work. They got to the villages by jeep and proceeded on foot, going house-by-house and then village-by-village to cover an area. They stayed overnight with their team in family compounds and ate whatever the host family provided.
Through the generosity of its viewers, the group has raised over $12,000 for Afghan charities.
In partnership with the Returned Peace Volunteers of Colorado